


When the Points Add Up

by iwillpaintasongforlou



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: I'm crying bye, M/M, Mostly fluff though, OT5 Friendship, bit angsty, demonization of management, harry is their baby brother, innuendos if you squint and some bad words but nearly angelic really, louis is the rogue and I cry about it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-26
Updated: 2014-11-26
Packaged: 2018-02-27 02:52:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2676278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwillpaintasongforlou/pseuds/iwillpaintasongforlou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis is physically incapable of following the rules, and Management is smart enough to know his weak spot: Harry. One stunt too many leaves Harry exiled to a room by himself all night and Louis rallies the others to devise a plan to get Harry his cuddles tonight no matter <i>what</i> Management says.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Points Add Up

**Author's Note:**

> Soooo I found this buried deep in my google drive and apparently I wrote this last December as a Christmas present for beautifulboyband on tumblr and then never posted it? *awkward cough* so uhhhh, here it is, 11 months late. Enjoy!

Louis has never really been one for following the rules. He’s more of a "do as I please" type of guy, which naturally has been a source of some conflict between him and his minders for the past 22 years.

"Louis, do this." "Louis, don't say that." "Louis, we're live on national television." I mean, how is a lad meant to _breathe_ with all of these rules pressing down on him? Louis can't figure it out, so for the most part, he just shrugs and thinks, "fuck the rules" and does what he wants anyways.

So it really shouldn't surprise anyone when he runs off 45 minutes before their show in New York City. He’s supposed to be backstage warming up and getting ready for the concert, so of _course_ he’s doing anything but that.

But people are surprised anyway. The fans that he runs into at the mall certainly are. "Louis?!" they shriek, approaching to hug him and press their cheeks to his for selfies. He makes sure to wink at least once- _here's to you, management._

"What are you doing here?" asks one girl. "You guys are supposed to perform in like an hour, aren't you?"

"Less than that, actually. Had to run out and pick something up really quick, though."

"Don't you have like, _people_ who can do that for you?"

Louis shoots them another grin even as he starts backing away. "Well yeah, but doing what I'm told isn't nearly as satisfying. Haven't you heard? I'm the rogue."

The crew that meet Louis backstage seem less surprised and more panicked. "Are you out of your mind?" Lou asks as she yanks his hair into place and sprays half a can of hairspray on it. "You go on in ten minutes. What the hell were you doing?"

"Shopping," Louis smirks as he tugs on his skinny jeans. " Are you done? I have things to do, yet."

He’s almost out the door before Lou catches his elbow. "You know your management is furious, yeah?"

"Yeah."

She just sighs. Louis does what Louis wants. Sometimes it’s best to just let him be.

The boys are the only ones who seem unbothered by his absence. “Found him,” Zayn says lazily around the man fiddling with his in-ear. Three other heads turn towards the miscreant, with indulgent smiles and eye rolls.

One particularly smiley boy bounds up to him. “I missed you,” Harry says sweetly, looking around surreptitiously before sneaking in a quick peck to Louis’ check. “Where’d you go?”

“Went to go get this for you.”

Louis pulls out from behind his back the balled up fabric he’s been carrying ever since arriving back at the arena. When it unfurls, Harry can see that it was the graphic tee that he’d been talking about wanting that afternoon as they all were kicking around a football outside of the tour bus. “You actually went and got it?” asks Harry, looking charmed. “I could have gotten it myself. Or gotten it tomorrow.”

“Yeah, well, I wanted to see you smile tonight,” Louis replies with a shrug and a smile for his sentimental giant of a boyfriend.

The stupid sap looks like he might actually cry or something. “Thank you, Lou, I’m touched.”

“Oh, are you?” smirks Louis, leaning forward to whisper in his ear. “Find me after the show and you certainly _will_ be touched.”

“Whatever you’re whispering to each other, don’t,” says Liam sternly. “There are microphones around, you know the rules.”

But that’s fine, really, because Harry is already blushing furiously. Another rule broken. Another mission accomplished. And another point for Louis.

He does not mention to Harry that he sincerely doubts that he _will_ be touching him too much that night. He’s been antsy the last few days, a little louder and wilder than usual, and management is at the end of their rope. Usually, it would build for a few days and then the hammer would come down, crushing Louis’ spirit and sending him into exile for his sins.

Aside from wanting to make Harry smile, this is one of the reasons Louis had fled the arena tonight- this was his last chance to cause trouble or have any freedom for the next few days, more than likely. Can you blame a guy for wanting one last taste of fresh air?

Sure enough, Management pulls him aside when the others are traipsing into the hotel that night. “Change of plans for the rooming arrangements tonight.”

Usually, there were three rooms: one with Harry and Louis, one with Niall and Liam, and one with Zayn- because he hated it when they disturbed his sleep with their antics and preferred to have a room of his own. But when the powers that be found themselves particularly pissed at Louis, he found himself cast off and sent to a room by his lonesome. It was as close to a time out as you could get for a twenty-two year-old man.

But Management, it seems, has a curveball tonight. “You’re going to be bunking with Niall, Liam with Zayn, and Harry will be in the solo room.”

 _Are you shitting me?_ Louis thinks. “Are you shitting me?” he says aloud. “Why the fuck’s Harry in his own room? You know he hates being alone.”

Even as he says it, the arrangement makes sense. Of course they know how Harry hates rooming alone. He’s had three years to get used to never being without his brothers or his boyfriend by his side, and if he winds up staying by himself he’ll be restless all night and feel like a zombie the whole next day because of it. And management knows that- once they’d been separated for a week while Harry’d gone to visit family, and management had to rearrange a whole day of promo because he came back looking so grey.

Of course they knew. That was their exact intention.

“Listen, this is bullshit,” Louis hisses, his temper flaring up quickly. “I’m the one who’s a pain in the arse, don’t take it out on Harry, yeah? Let him room with Niall, at least.”

“Sorry, I’m not sure that we can make that happen. You’re in 302. Here’s your key.”

“Give it to someone else, I don’t fucking want it.”

“Don’t throw a fit, Louis. People might see, and we’ll have to start in with PR stunts. Maybe if one of you got a new girlfriend… what do you think? Should Harry get a new girlfriend? Might help his image a bit.”

Louis clamps his jaw shut and cements it in place with willpower and fury. They’re threatening Harry with a beard, and _damn_ if that wasn’t the one thing Louis would climb Mount Everest to prevent. Management knows all too well that the most effective way to punish Louis is to hurt Harry. And if he isn’t careful, they’ll continue to make Harry miserable for as long as it takes to break Louis.

It’s kind of genius, in a way. A sick, cruel, and really fucking _rude_ way.

He snatches the room key in silence. The sadness on Harry’s face when Management tells him he’ll be rooming alone is enough to break Louis, and it sort of feels like a win for Management.

As soon as things are settled that night, though, Louis’ poking his head out of the door and glancing up and down the hotel hallway. No one but security. He’s all prepared to slip down the hall to Harry’s room, but-

“Sorry, Lou, you’re on lockdown,” says one of the team regretfully. “Express orders.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Louis sighs, but he doesn’t wait for a response. Of course they’re serious. He’s really, _really_ in the doghouse tonight.

But the door hasn’t even slammed before he’s formulating a new plan, one complicated enough that it just might work and stupid enough that no one would suspect it. The thing that his keepers have forgotten to account for is that nothing, not any rule nor any ruler, is going to keep him from what he wants- and what he wants, as ever, is his Harry.

He doesn’t really expect the plan to work. I mean, calling Zayn over to swap clothes with him, then jumping over the divider in the balcony to Liam’s room and swapping clothes with _him,_ having Liam-dressed-as Zayn hop the railing to go down the hall to the elevators with Niall, then having Zayn-dressed-as Louis go talk to security to confuse them while Louis- dressed-as-Liam snuck across the hall to Harry’s room is about as thin of a plan as you could manage. He doesn’t stop being surprised until after he’s been standing in the dark of Harry’s hotel room for a good thirty seconds. _Well done, Tommo. Well done._

The flickering light of the TV shows Harry outlined on the bed, lying on his side facing away from the door. The telly is muted, but Louis can hear from here the music blasting from Harry’s headphones. He doesn’t move a muscle, completely unaware that he isn’t alone.

And while the prankster in Louis cries out for him to take advantage of this beautiful opportunity to pounce and alarm, he isn’t feeling much like a prankster tonight. He is more feeling like a very tired, very sweet lover that just wants to wrap his arms around the boy being punished for Louis’ own sins. So that’s what he does. And the second his body finds the curve of Harry’s waist to curl around, Harry is melting into him with a satisfied sigh.

“I thought you were on lockdown,” Harry murmurs once he’s tugged his headphones out and tossed the phone aside. He turns around in Louis’ embrace so that he can nuzzle into his neck. “And why do you smell like Liam?”

“It’s a long story. I had to use my secret agent skills to get to you tonight, you know.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Missed my baby, though. Couldn’t stay away.”

Harry probably knows that Louis is just being cheesy to make him smile, but that doesn’t make him grin any less. He stretches his mouth up for a kiss, sighing into the feel of Louis’ lips on his at the end of a long day. They don’t break away for a long while, until Louis smells more like Harry than Liam and Harry is warm from his head to his toes.

“Better stop,” Louis warns after a while, when the kisses start getting deeper. “Company’s on the way.”

“Why’d you invite them, Lou?” pouts Harry. “I was trying to reward you for your bravery.”

“They took their clothes off for me, love, I owe them the right to comfort their baby brother.”

 _Sigh._ “Fine, I guess.”

When the others arrive one by one, though, Harry welcomes them more graciously. They’re all here at Louis’ request, to cuddle around Harry and keep him warm and happy through the night because, “I have to go back to my room soon. I have a feeling security’s going to check on me.”

Harry sighs again. “Yeah, probably.”

“I should go.”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll miss you.”

“Me too. A lot. All night.”

Niall rolls his eyes. “Would you two give it a rest? It’s one night, not a decade.”

Which of course just solidifies Louis’ desire to snog Harry a few more times, more passionately than is appropriate with three other lads in the bed, until he’s breathless and grinning and watching Louis go with shining green eyes. That’s better anyway. A nice parting image to keep Louis sane tonight.

His Niall disguise may not completely fool security when he makes his way back into their room, but they don’t say anything. And when Management comes around a few minutes later to check he hasn’t run off, Louis is calmly watching footie and looking the very picture of innocence that he is not.

And even if he doesn’t quite get what he wants that night, he gets what he _needs-_ a Harry that is comforted and calm and loved, no matter what. Another rule broken. Another mission accomplished.

Another point for love.

**Author's Note:**

> Plan B involved rappelling, just so you know. Nobody puts baby in a ~~corner~~ hotel room by himself all night.
> 
> canonlarry | tumblr


End file.
